Wednesday, 20 November 2013

It is not often church decline
makes the national newspapers, but when a former Archbishop says the church is
on the brink of extinction I guess such news is too hard to resist, even for a
largely non-religious media [1]. What George Carey actually said was: “we are one generation away from extinction”,
meaning the Church of England [2]. Contrary to the Daily Mail headline he did
not use the word “brink” in the transcript of his speech. However in the light
of the data fitting I have done recently, where the Church of England’s
attendance data was compared with the Limited Enthusiasm church growth model, the
Mail’s headline is quite prophetic as the church is just on the extinction
threshold [3].

Rather than rely on the newspapers
I thought I would look at what George Carey actually said and see how it
squares with my church growth modelling.
In fact his talk was very insightful and the warnings of decline were
balanced with some very encouraging advice to the church. One of his opening
remarks sets the tone:

My time when
I was a Minister in Durham – now a long time ago – convinced me that churches
can grow, should grow and must grow. I firmly believe that the most dire
situation can be redeemed and the most impossible church can be turned around.

That is the sort of comment I wish I had come up with, but
then he is a former leader of the church so he does know more about this than
me! It summarises what I have been trying to show with my models that small
changes in effort in church life can change decline to growth, even revival
growth. This is what tipping point theory in any form of social diffusion is
about, small things making a big difference. The principle is analysed in the
academic world [4] and popularised as a best seller [5]. So there is always
hope, and especially so for the church where we have God’s promises to grow the
church and take the gospel to all nations, and His power to deliver it!

The former archbishop set out four challenges for the church:

1. Let us appreciate the church but let us re-imagine
it.

He further
explains this by saying “What I am urging
is a return to basics where our expectation is for transformed lives” [2].
The church needs to recognise that the preached gospel changes lives.

Now I have
just come back from a sociology of religion conference in the USA. As ever I
get in trouble because my models use words like “unbeliever”, and “conversion”.
I get suggestions to change conversion to recruitment [6]. I agree if I were
modelling a political party, a pressure group or the local tennis club
“recruit” would be an ideal word. But Jesus does not recruit people, he changes
them, they are converted from the world to Him. The event as far as the church
is concerned is entirely different. New Christians do not just join a club; they
are changed people.

Yet often I
find churches prefer to think in non-spiritual terms, as if the spiritual side
of church embarrasses them. When the church thinks in the world’s terms it gets
the world’s results. Thus George Carey is spot on when he says the church needs
to re-imagine itself and think of itself in spiritual terms. He presents
various pieces of evidence to show that the world is crying for spiritual fulfillment,
and only the church can meet that, as only Christ can deliver it.

By the way
I will not be changing my “convert” variables to “recruit”. I will continue to
get in trouble!

2. Our task is to nurture fellow Christians but
also to grow authentic disciples.

It is not
enough to encourage believers; they must also be discipled. That is, there is
growth in quality, not just quantity. He quotes the Saddleback Church approach
of four discipleship categories: membership, maturity, ministry, and mission.
The aim is to release all Christians into ministry and mission, and thus be
part of the process that builds the church and gathers new converts.

Like my
models there is recognition that there are different categories of Christians
and the aim is to progress people through. This is the basis of the Discipleship
System Dynamics Model developed by some church pastors and myself [7]. Once we
have recognized that there are such categories of Christians, strategies can be
developed to get people where they should be. The right resources, in the right
place at the right time. In
particular Christians should be able to reproduce themselves by making new
converts, the enthusiast category, even though it makes big demands on people. So
yet again the former archbishop was right, “If
the gospel is as we say, a matter of life and death, then we must make demands
… May I encourage you to make
discipleship one of the key targets of the coming year “ [2],

3. Let’s acknowledge the role of Christians in
society but let us aim to be agents of social transformation.

Lord Carey
explains, “Every church should have one
or two relevant ministries to the world around [2]”. By this he means
ministry in society, i.e. outside the church. Of course the primary reason to
serve communities is for their benefit, in particularly the individuals in
need. But the very important side effect is that it widens the church’s
influence in society. The gospel reaches more people. In modeling terms we say
there is a larger susceptible pool of potential converts. The size of that pool
has a disproportionate effect on growth, and even a moderate increase can tip
church into growth, a growth that goes viral. Yet again George Carey’s
suggestions hit right at the heart of church growth.

The former
archbishop expands this concept to youth work, which triggers the remark picked
up by the Mail and the Telegraph. He says that without work among young people
the church is only one generation away from extinction. He is of course
correct, if there are no converts and young people brought up in the church are
lost, then the church dies out in one generation, about 70 years to be a bit
more precise. Of course there are always some children retained and even some
converts, so it actually last a few generations, but at numbers well below what
it is now.

It has been
a thesis of mine that for most denominations and congregations there have not
been sufficient conversions in the church since the middle of the 19th
century, the 1859 revival to be precise. Since then the church has largely grown
and survived by retaining sufficient of its own children, and a high birth rate
in society. Once the birth rate fell in the 20th century, and then
child retention in church dropped with the post-war rise in wealth, the lack of
conversions was exposed and the church has declined ever since. It could no
longer live on all the good work done in the 18th and first half of
the 19th centuries. So in practice it has been many generations from
extinction through a slow and drawn out death, but the reasons are exactly what
George Carey has said.

But Carey makes
a second observation under this heading, he says there is a lack of “energy” in
church, and contrasts it with the much higher energy among Muslims. In our [8] modeling,
that energy we call spiritual life and can be thought of as the common resource
generated when like-minded people work together effectively [9]. As Christians
we would also say there is a genuinely spiritual dimension to this concept,
coming from the Holy Spirit himself, but such shared non-physical resources
occur in all organisations, sometimes identified as social capital. If this energy increases then the
effect on growth is dramatic. Lord Carey is right; lack of energy is the source
of our problems, lack of the Holy Spirit! He suggests the need for “spiritual renewal and the touch of the Holy
Spirit” [2].

This
energy, or spiritual life, has a direct impact on the reproduction potential of
enthusiasts. In our modelling we find the reproduction potential among Muslims much
bigger than that of the Christian church, and well over the revival growth
threshold. This will not have to continue for much longer for there to be more
practicing Muslims than church attenders in England [10]. The lack of
reproduction in the church is a direct result of the lack of energy, or spiritual
life, in the church producing little community involvement and low conversion rates
of unbelievers. But the archbishop gives the solution, get involved with
society, replenish your spiritual energy, and sow for the future among the
youth.

4. The fourth area is to continue to encourage
giving but to promote authentic stewardship.

George
Carey expands this by saying: “my long
experience of serving in the church has convinced me that lack of resources is
one of our biggest challenges and yet one of our greatest opportunities” [2].
He has now moved from spiritual resources to physical resources, money and time,
as determined by the level of commitment to Christ. Indeed he says this giving
is a “proclamation and demonstration of
belonging to Jesus”.[2]

Again he is
right in saying that such sacrificial commitment is key to growth. In the
church growth models the most effective Christians are called “enthusiasts”,
because they have the most commitment. They are the ones sold out for the cause
of Christ.

This level
of commitment can be contrasted with other forms of social diffusion. In our
modelling we have been trying to explain why there has been such a massive
swing of opinion in society in favour of same-sex relationships, when only a
generation ago most of society were opposed [11]. This change is faster than
generational, so older people must have been changing opinion during that time.
One factor has been the huge commitment of the gay rights activists, who have
been working to change opinion in various sectors of the community, especially
churches, through well-organized campaigns [12]. They have brought large corporate
companies on their side [13], and have been particularly successful in employing social media
[14].

To be fair gay
rights activists have only been seeking to change opinions, an easier option
than that of Christianity which seeks to change lives, hearts, souls, minds and
behaviour. Christianity is about
conversion, not recruitment to a cause. Nevertheless the commitment of gay
rights activists to their cause puts the commitment of many Christians to shame,
especially given that Christians are offering Christ and eternal life to people
who know they will die! Same-sex marriage was won because its activists and
supporters had higher commitment than that of their counterparts in support of
traditional marriage, most of whom were silent, asleep or too embarrassed to
engage [15]. Likewise the church in the UK is losing out because its members
are less committed than those of Islam, Humanism or even Paganism [16]. Even in the face of near extinction most
churches still seem unable to muster up more than an hour or so of commitment a
week from their members, and that concerns satisfying their own needs rather
than engaging in mission.

Conclusion

The former
archbishop, Lord Carey, has given a very insightful analysis of what is wrong
in the UK church, but more importantly how it can be put right: Spirituality,
discipleship, social transformation, energy and commitment. These are areas I
have tried to model and will endeavour to model better. May his words [2] be
read by many Christians, taken to heart and lead to sustainable church growth.

References & Notes

[1] Steve Doughty, Church
'is on the brink of extinction': Ex-Archbishop George Carey warns of
Christianity crisis, The Daily Mail, Tuesday 19th November 2013.

[8] When I say “our” in connection with church growth
modelling I mean university students of mine who work on various forms of
church/religious growth, and social diffusion, as degree and research projects.

[10] Of
course this will not show up on census figures, as the people who identify
themselves as Christian are many times larger than those who call themselves
Muslim. This is because most people who call themselves Christian do not
participate in church! Participation rates are much higher in the heritage
Muslim community than in the heritage Christian community. Thus even if the growth trend continues
Islam will remain much smaller than Christianity for many generations. If Islam
progresses along the same path of nominality that the Christian church has done
then it will remain the minority.

[15] With of course some obvious exceptions in the UK such
as the Evangelical Alliance, Care for the Family, the Christian Institute, the
leaders of the Catholic church and of course Lord Carey himself.

[16] There are again many exceptions. But generally,
averaged across the church, commitment and conversion, is low.

Wednesday, 9 October 2013

The decline of the Church of England has been well
publicised for many years. Because of the connections between church and state
the future survival of the church is of interest to many agencies, both Christian
and otherwise. Any new attendance figures are likely to make mainstream news,
with discussion of the church’s future prospects. In this blog I will apply one of my church growth models to
the Church of England attendance figures and examine how serious that decline
might be. First let me set the context.

The Christian Church in the UK has been steadily declining
for over 50 years. With a total church membership reaching a peak of 10.3
million in 1930 a slow decline followed with a brief recovery through the 1950s.
Since 1960 membership has fallen from 9.9 million in 1960 to 5.9 million in
2000 [1]. It was down further to 5.5 million in 2010 [2]. Not surprisingly the Church of England’s
membership has fallen in a similar fashion, from 2.9 million in 1960 to 1.2 million
in 2010 [3,4].

Before analysing figures for the Church of England, some
comparisons would be useful. Church decline is remarkably slow compared with
the decline in membership of other institutions. For example political parties
fare very badly, with the conservative party falling from a high of 2.9 million
in 1951, to 1 million in 1990 and to less than 150,000 in 2012 [5,6]. Similar
dramatic falls are recorded for other political parties and the Trade Union
movement. Church decline is part of a wider decline in commitment in Western
society, and by no means the worst. So although the Church of England is right
to be concerned about its decline, it has been considerably more successful in
resisting that decline than non-religious institutions of a similar size.

Questions

This blog seeks to answer two questions: Will the Church of
England continue to decline? If so will it become extinct or is there any sign
of a recovery?

A straight statistical projection would indicate that the
Church of England will eventually become extinct, although long after most of
the other UK mainstream denominations (and well after the major political
parties!) But statistical projections only examine data, they do not factor in
any theory as to why a church grows or declines. Thus they may miss some
underlying reason why the church may not go extinct.

Limited Enthusiasm Model

The approach I have taken is to construct a model based on
the theory that church growth is driven by a sub-class of church members,
called enthusiasts, who are instrumental in bringing about conversions into the
church. The model is then compared with church data in order to estimate model
parameters, and determine the likely future for the church, assuming the theory
is correct [7]. Unbelievers are also split into those who are open to joining the
church and those who are hardened to the church.

A key result of this “Limited Enthusiasm” Model is the
existence of two thresholds, or tipping points, connected with extinction and
revival-growth. These thresholds are compared with the reproduction potential,
which measures the ability of enthusiasts to reproduce themselves [8]. If the
reproduction potential is under the extinction threshold the church eventually
declines to zero, if it is over the threshold the church survives. Likewise if
the reproduction potential is over the revival-growth threshold, church growth
is rapid, similar to that seen in religious revivals. Both thresholds depend on
the birth, death and loss rates, and the revival-growth threshold also depends
on the current fraction of open unbelievers in the population.

Although some of the model parameters are difficult to
determine the placement of the reproduction potential compared with the
thresholds is more robustly determined. Thus it is possible to be more
confident of a church’s extinction or survival, even if there is more variation
in the parameter and threshold values. Essentially the model is interpreting
curvature in the data in terms of the behaviour of enthusiasts. Thus if the
decline is slowing it may indicate enthusiasts are reproducing themselves enough
for the church to survive.

Analysis of Church of England Attendance 1979-2005

Attendance is a much better indicator of participation than
membership in the Church of England as the latter is based on electoral role,
which has not always required participation as a reason for inclusion. However it is only in recent history that
attendance figures have been consistently obtained. The methodology for their
collection must be consistent over time otherwise curvature in the data set
will be wrongly interpreted.

My earlier publications in church growth were based on the English
Church Attendance Surveys conducted by Christian Research, under the then
leadership of Peter Brierley [9]. By the 1998 attendance survey the Church of
England was under the extinction threshold, although not massively so [10]. By
the 2005 survey its situation had improved, the church was just on the
extinction threshold [11]. That is
the Church of England was just avoiding future extinction. Unfortunately there have
been no more attendance surveys since, so no further results can be obtained
from this source.

Analysis of Church of England Attendance 2001-2011

Since 2001 the Church of England has been reporting its own
attendance figures. Although these cannot be compared with the figures of
Christian Research, they use different methodologies, the data can be used to
assess the extinction/survival status since 2001. The most recent data is for
2011 [12]. Additional data sources, such as birth rates etc., are used to
estimate a number of model parameters [13].

The data used is the combined all-age Sunday and weekday
attendance [12, table 4]. Weekday attendance at churches has been growing, perhaps
due to an aging population, and due to churches being more willing to diversify
in their approach to reaching communities. It has now become sufficiently large
that it cannot be ignored. The church quotes highest, average and lowest figures.
The average has been used. Because the Limited Enthusiasm model is interpreting
changes over time, it is not critical which of the three data sets are used,
providing they have been consistently measured each year.

A best fit between model and data gives a value for the
reproduction potential and the two thresholds. Many such “best fits” are
obtained for a variety of other parameter values [14]. The majority of best
fits, 66%, indicate that the church will avoid extinction, however there is no
convincing sign that there is any underlying revival growth. The most likely
scenario is that the Church of England will survive, but at a significantly
reduced level.

It may be helpful to compare a typical pessimistic data fit,
where the Church of England eventually becomes extinct, with an optimistic fit,
where the church survives. Figure 1 compares two such fits with the data [15].
There is little to choose between them on the basis of the data from 2001 to
2011. However extrapolating from 2012 onwards the optimistic scenario shows increasing
signs of a slow down in decline. The predicted difference by 2020 is quite significant.

Figure 1: Best Fit to Church of England Attendance 2001-2011

On the basis of attendance figures alone it is not possible
to distinguish between the pessimistic and optimistic fits. To draw a clearer
conclusion additional information is required, such as the number of enthusiasts,
which would be very difficult to measure. However evidence for the effect of enthusiasts, such as
increasing use of the Alpha course, community engagement, prayer meetings,
church planting etc. might be easier to obtain, and would help in given more
confidence in one scenario over the other.

The two scenarios can be extrapolated further into the
future, assuming enthusiasts remain at the same effectiveness. The top graph of figure 2 gives church
attendance. The pessimistic fit shows decline at the same rate to almost 2040,
however the optimistic fit suggest the church starts growing again after 2035. This is due to a recovery in
enthusiasts, as seen in the bottom graph of figure 2. In the optimistic scenario the
enthusiasts start increasing again, nationally, after 2020. This is enough for
the church to avoid extinction and dropping below an attendance of 800,000, but
not enough for it to return to the 2001 figure.

As optimistic scenarios were the more common of the data
fits then there is some confidence that the Church of England may not be
declining so much as to become extinct and will see a small recovery in the
next 20 years.

Conditions

There are a number of conditions that must be applied to
this result.

1. The church has an increasingly older age profile than
society, thus the death rate of its attenders will increase over time. Thus
recovery would take longer. The above scenarios in the previous graph are notpredictions for actual numbers, but an indication that the Church of Engalnd is most likely above the extinction threshold.

2. The model aggregates together congregations that are dying
through aging, perhaps the majority, with a smaller number of growing and
healthy congregations where most of the enthusiasts are based. In that case the
underlying growth in enthusiasts would be underestimated and the reproduction
potential of the enthusiasts should be higher. Thus the church would be more
likely to see a future recovery. Such a recovery would involve churches with
enthusiasts re-starting congregations in redundant parishes so that new pools
of unbelievers can be tapped.

3. The birth rate has been assumed to remain constant. It has
increased recently in the UK, and this may make future growth in the church a
little easier.

4. Migration has been assumed constant. Migration has had a
large impact on Pentecostal and independent churches in London, but it is
doubtful if it has had much impact on the Church of England nationally.
Migration may fall in the future; there again it may increase.

Strategies to Improve Church of England’s Attendance

If the Limited Enthusiasm Model is correct then strategies
that improve the number and the quality of enthusiasts are the key to church
growth. Such improvement can come
through spiritual renewal, mission training, discipleship, community contacts
and outpourings of the Holy Spirit. It is not a question of choosing one over
the other but of using all. For many churches it can start with a change of
awareness that the individual members of a congregation are as important to its
growth as its leaders, and that each person needs to embrace that
responsibility.

In addition the thresholds of extinction and revival growth
can be lowered by improving retention of adults and children in the church. Widening
the contact between a church and its community will further lower the
revival-growth threshold, making rapid growth more likely. A combined policy of
improving enthusiasts, stemming losses, and increasing community contacts can
make the difference between extinction and revival [10].

Although the Church of England is declining, and will do so
for some time, there is evidence that its ability to avoid extinction is
improving. If it continues to apply policies to generate enthusiasts and retain
people, and makes those policies more widespread, it is very possible that
sustained decline can be turned into sustained growth. Although this research cannot be used to predict actual numbers I hope it will be used to give encouragement to the Church, that it can survive and turn decline back into growth.

References and Notes

[1] Brierley P. Religious Trends 2000/2001, no.2. Table
2.12, page 2.12, Christian Research. There is no reliable measure of attendance
for most Christian denominations spanning 1900-2000, thus membership is the
best indicator of church growth and decline for this period.

[13] A number of
parameters in the model needed to be estimated from sources other than the
attendance data. Birth and death rates are taken from recent figures published
by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Migration is added to the birth rate.
Average figures are taken.

The reversion rate is
estimated at 5% per year, typical of figures that were obtained by data fits to
a variety of churches [10]. It should be noted that small variations in this
figure have little effect on the likelihood of extinction or survival.

Retention of children
born to church members is taken as 30%. This figure is based on religious
transmission rates for Christianity given as a comparison with Islam in
“Intergenerational Transmission of Islam in England and Wales: Evidence from
the Citizenship Survey”, Scourfield J., Taylor C., Moore G., and Gilliat-Ray S., Sociology, 46(1): 91-108. For a summary see:

The average time taken
for a leaver to be open to returning to church again was taken as 20 years.
This figure is based on a past survey where only 20% of those who leave church
return and that after an average of 10 years. [9, The Tide is Running Out, p.84]

[14] Estimates of initial
numbers for 2001 need some care. Although the total population and the numbers
of believers are known (ONS and [12] respectively), it is not possible to even guess the fraction of
the church who are enthusiasts, or the fraction of unbelievers who are
hardened. Instead many simulations are run with a variety of values and best
fits obtained for each. The number in the hardened group is assumed not to
change dramatically during the period.

Monday, 16 September 2013

It is now 5 months since the phenomenon that has
become known as the Welsh Outpouring started in Victory Church Cwmbran, Wales.
Although I, and others, have referred to this as the “Cwmbran Outpouring”,
Welsh Outpouring is a better description as this has always been about what God
intends to do in Wales, not just in Cwmbran. The weekend
6-7th Sept was very
much a watershed as the church hosted the Wales for Christ conference in the St
David’s theatre Cardiff.

Wales for Christ

What was remarkable about this conference is that the same
power and presence of God experienced in the warehouse in Cwmbran was present
in the St David’s theatre Cardiff. There were different speakers, different
worship bands, and very different surroundings, but it made no difference, God
blessed exactly the same. Even though there were breaks between sessions, we
just came back in to the same presence each time. On top of that the meeting
did much to motivate and inspire people to do what is needed: take Wales for
Christ, to spread the gospel and see conversions in our land. It may have been
a conference but it was like back-to-back outpouring meetings!

It would be unfair of me to give a review of the talks as I
may misrepresent the speakers. Hopefully the church will make the talks
available online for people to hear for themselves. There are however two
things I want to pick up that connect with my church growth work.

Firstly, Andrew Parsons, a pastor at Victory church,
expressed the longing to see “more going to heaven than going to hell”. I certainly
can’t fault the sentiment, but it got me thinking – has this happened in the
past? Of course we can’t measure how many people are going to heaven, and until
recently it has been hard to measure how many attend church, but we can measure
how many belong to a church.

Let’s go back to the 1904-5 revival in Wales. In 1903 the
combined membership of all protestant denominations in Wales comprised some
47.4% of the Welsh adult population [1]. After the revival in 1905 the
membership stood at 53.4%. In the two years of the revival the increases in
membership of the churches were 5.4% and 11.5% respectively. Compared with
typical increases of around 1% per year before that it is clear the 1904-5
revival had a remarkable effect on church membership. If we were cheeky and
said that all church members were on the way to heaven and the rest were not,
then the Andrew Parson’s comment was actually achieved by the 1904-5 revival!
But I admit that is a bit cheeky; there are a whole host of reasons why that
identification cannot be made. But it sets the context for a longing for more
to be saved than not saved.

What should be remembered is that a church membership of
53.4% of the adult population was the largest ever achieved in Wales since
records have been kept from the early 1800s. The 1700s would have been much
lower still. Indeed the current participation rates of less than 10% in church
are more typical history than a 50% membership/commitment. England did not get
anywhere near that figure! To expect more in church than not in church is very
unrealistic, unless like the 1905 figure for Wales, it had been preceded
by outpourings of the Spirit and much hard work by the Christians in the
church. The 1904-5 revival was the pinnacle of what God had started in 1735,
and a church of enthusiasts worked with God’s Spirit to achieve it. Given that
we are now going though an outpouring, and the Wales for Christ weekend showed
how committed many people are to spreading the gospel, I would say the Andrew
Parson’s longing for more going to heaven than hell is an achievable aim,
despite the current desperate attendance figures of the church. God is moving
again, he did it before, so he can do it again! It may just take a bit of time.

Secondly, one of the afternoon speakers, evangelist Mark
Greenwood, was talking about the unusual and enthusiastic forms of witness
among Christians, the ones who are “bonkers” for Christ. He longed that people
would be bonkers for Him again and take “risks” with their witness. He then said
about such people, somewhat ironically, “2 years of discipleship class will
squeeze that out of them!” I.e. their enthusiasm would have been diminished through
the institution of church! I have
fitted my church growth models to a wide variety of denominations in the UK,
USA and some other countries and 2 years is about the typical length of the
enthusiastic period that comes out of nearly all of them [2]. So it may have
been an offhand comment by Mark Greenwood, but I have plenty of data to back it
up.

The reasons for enthusiasm only lasting 2 years after
conversion may be much wider then the stifling influence of an institution.
Often it is that people get more involved in church and lose their unconverted
friends, or that those friends have got used to the way the new convert
behaves. They are no longer new. But one of the effects of an outpouring is to
renew existing believers, even old-timers. So it may be after the last five
months many Christians are about to go “bonkers” for Christ!

The Future of the Welsh Outpouring

In the last week Victory church have announced that they are
reducing the number of outpouring meetings from five a week to two. Clearly the
people involved are tired, the commitment by the church has been immense and I
am very thankful for all their hard work. Some people, particularly the outpouring’s
detractors, may see this as a fad that has passed, but far from it. The purpose
of an outpouring is to move people out into the communities, spread the gospel
and make converts and disciples. The outpouring does not end because time is
released to pursue the mission; it just enters a different phase. The same
happened in 1904-5 revival, the special meetings passed in 1905, but new churches
with an emphasis on the work of the Spirit were started and established over
the following 20 years or more, the work of the Spirit did not stop, but
spread, in that case all over the world.

In the Acts of the Apostles, the church did not stay in Jerusalem,
the place where the blessing was first received, they moved out into Samaria,
Judea and the ends of the Earth, even if God had to give them a bit of a shove
with persecution. They could not continue going to the temple and meeting in
rooms each day, however powerful the blessings. Remarkably God did more wonders
through them among the population than he did in their gatherings – the meat is
on the street, as the late John Wimber was fond of saying. Even more remarkably
there were public outpourings of the Spirit on people, as shown in
Samaria, Caesarea, and Ephesus. The outpouring moves to a different phase, no
longer tied by location and worship meetings, but in the market place, just
about anywhere.

A similar pattern of outpouring and expansion can be seen in
the 1700s in Wales. Early on the Spirit was poured out in Llangeitho, through
the conversion and ministry of Daniel Rowland. A similar move took place at
Trevecca with Howell Harris. But the work did not stop at those centres. Slowly
various groups of Methodists were established in different parts of Wales. The
centre of the outpouring remained at Llangeitho, sometimes people would visit
for a couple of weeks at a time, but at the same time new fellowships were
being planted across Wales. The result was rapid church growth up to the
mightiest revival of all in 1859. The sequence: outpouring, plant, build up, was repeated for over 100
years. Certain periods, where the work of the Spirit was so intense, have
become known as the “revivals”, but the outpouring rarely stopped in that
period [3].

The vision put out by Wales for Christ at the conference is
for such a church planting initiative. This was of course planned before the
outpouring started, but the outpouring has now given more momentum to the
plans. Indeed what outpourings do is create hunger and expectation in visitors
from other parts of the country, so that when the church plant takes place
there are local enthusiasts, touched by the King in the outpouring, ready to be
part of the church plant. In addition the new plant widens the pool of
unbelievers the church can reach, the susceptibles in epidemiological terms.
This can put the church back over the tipping point for revival growth.
Outpourings generate the needed enthusiasts; church plants tip the church into
revival growth. This is how the 18th and 19th century
Welsh Methodists took Wales for Christ, it is how the New Frontiers and
Vineyard denominations have been growing in the last 20 years, and this is the
direction of Victory church now. Thus scaling down the outpouring meetings
makes perfect sense. Incidentally church planting is not a strategy Victory
church are expecting to do alone, and they hoped that other churches in Wales
would do the same [4].

Characteristics of the Welsh Outpouring

Certain characteristics of the outpouring have struck me as
being typical of revival:

1. Experiencing the
outpouring is like being saved again. I know you can only become a
Christian once, but when the Spirit moves even the most mature in Christ
realise their sins and find refuge at the cross again. This for me has been a
feature of every meeting I have been to at Cwmbran. I have heard people say they have felt they have been born
again “again”. There are similar experiences in the Bible [5] and in past
revivals [6].

2. The emphasis on
the blood of the Lamb. It was the late Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones who said one
of the signs of an authentic revival is that there is a renewed emphasis on the
blood of Christ [7]. That is, there is a return to the cross as the only means
of salvation through the substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ. It is fair
to say this is probably one of the most unpopular doctrines in the Christian
church generally and Christians of all churchmanships either dismiss it or revise
it. But when the Spirit moves, back it comes. This has been the experience at
Cwmbran, as shown by the types of songs and hymns that have been sung, and the
constant cross-centred sermons.

3. The after effects
of the meetings. I have referred to this in previous blogs [8], Jesus being
even closer in the days and weeks following a meeting. This is the difference
between a human-led meeting, which can excite for a moment, and a Spirit-led
one, which makes permanent changes. Examples of this can be found in many of
the revivals of the past [9].

4. The number
converted. For this we can only go on the number of reported first time
commitments, which was 1157 after outpouring meeting 157 [10]. There have been
more since. This may seem small compared with the 100,000 converts in the 15
months of the 1904-5 revival, but the current “Welsh” outpouring is one church;
there were hundreds of churches involved in 1904-5. So over 1000 first time
commitments is remarkable, even if all were not actually converted.

Final Thoughts

It should be noted that this outpouring is home grown,
that is, it is Welsh!
One of
the great joys of this outpouring is that it started in Wales, it was not something
brought in from outside! Before you think this is a strange outburst of
national pride, let me explain why this is important to me. Back in 2002 an
Anglican clergyman gave a prophecy to my own church at one of our renewal days
about the situation in Wales. He said, “the problem in Welsh churches is that
people are always waiting for someone, like a big name preacher, to come to
Wales to bring a blessing, to light the fire. You hear it in the prayers for
revival. But I say don’t wait for others, light your own fires.” We took
that to heart as a church and got down to the work of renewal.

The Welsh Outpouring is an example of “lighting your own
fires”, but on a much larger scale. God works through us to revive his
church, we do not need to wait for a celebrity preacher to come. Indeed the
most powerful meetings in the Welsh Outpouring have been the ones led by the
local pastors and worship groups, not the visiting preachers.

Perhaps the fact that Welsh Christians “lit their own fires”
will help us regain our confidence that God will work powerfully in this land,
and banish the low esteem in Welsh churches [11]. I am deeply grateful for all commitment the people at Victory
church have shown in this outpouring; those who have been “lighting the fires”.
Outpourings are of God, but our response is hard work. I have learnt more about the work of God
in revival in the last five months than in the last thirty years of Christian
experience, and more than I could ever learn in a lifetime of reading books on
revival! I am very much looking forward to seeing how this move of God develops.

References and Notes

[1] See Explanatory Notes on "Mathematical Modeling of
Church Growth”.

Church membership and Anglican electoral role were not open
to children so they have been excluded from the figures. The Roman Catholic Church
was relatively small at the time, and as my data source did not have accurate
figures for them they are also excluded.

[2] The enthusiastic period in the 1904-5 revival was much
shorter, a matter of weeks. This is because the actions of the enthusiasts that
drove the growth, such as invites to the revival meetings, was very different
to the normal measured pattern of witness in the family and work place. The
revival was about “come to tonight’s meeting”. Most people who could be invited
would have been invited within a couple of weeks of the first experience.

[4] Victory Church has announced another church plant. They
have six churches so far. Someone from another Welsh church of a different
denomination told me they had a new plant in Wales coming soon, with another in
the planning stage.

[5] Psalm 51 is a classic account, and the life of the
apostle Peter shows similar post conversion experiences of conversion.

[6] David Matthews (2002) [1951], I Saw the Welsh Revival, Ambassador Publications, chapter 9. His
personal experience of what the revival felt
like for him is essential reading for all Christians seeking a move of God.
This will let you know what to expect!

[9] David Matthews (2002) [1951], I Saw the Welsh Revival, Ambassador Publications, chapter 6,
pp.46-47. David Matthews was very fond of “quality” church music and viewed
Sankey hymns with disdain. But the revival changed that and he found himself
leaving the “heavenly atmosphere” of a meeting at five in the morning,
whistling the hymn, “Throw Out the Lifeline”. Remarkably he heard someone else
that night whistling it with him. It was a policeman, also indelibly changed by
the revival. The policeman asked him, “Have you caught the revival fever too?”
Indeed Matthews had caught it, and the effects of the revival persisted with
him for the coming months and indeed the rest of his life, as his book
illustrates.

[10] Given out at the Wales for Christ weekend 6-7th
September 2013.

[11] I often preach on revival in churches and I get the
same message back wherever I go, “the last revival immunised Wales against revival, it won’t happen again”. There is a
great need for people to move from reading stories of what God did in past
revivals to believing what he can do now. Hopefully the outpouring will do
this.

Wednesday, 4 September 2013

Recently I came across two comments about liberalism within
the Christian church that struck me:

Liberal theology
cannot sustain a local congregation. It kills churches. In fact, it only
survives due to tenured academics. Rick Warren [1]

Congregationally speaking, Protestant liberalism is deader than Henry
VIII. While survey after survey shows a secularizing American population, this
hasn't helped the growth of liberal Protestant churches. Where are the
Unitarian mega-churches, the Episcopalian church-planting movements? Russell D. Moore [2]

As both comments have implications for church growth I
thought I would explore them with the help of some system dynamics.

Definitions

Note that the Rick Warren comment refers to liberal theology,
but the Russell Moore comment refers to liberal churches. The two concepts are related but not
identical. For now though I will define a liberal church as one with a liberal
theology, realising that this is not the whole story.

A liberal theology refers to a method of arriving at truth
which uses scripture as a general, and non-exclusive, guide rather than as a
set of propositions that must be believed. Thus rather than scripture
indicating a fixed canon of belief for all time, its truths may be modified
according to the age. Unlike orthodoxy the bias of the human authors of
scripture can be questioned, and even the text itself. Material from outside
the Bible, such as history and tradition, may have equal value in determining
truth, all weighed by human reason. Thus in a liberal church there is never a
fixed set of beliefs. Such a church will be lenient over what it considers the
faith, and would expect diversity within its midst.

Now I suspect that this definition does not do justice to
the use of the word “liberal” by many people, including Christians who call
themselves liberal. There are degrees of liberalism, and some may emphasise
liberalism in behaviour more than that of doctrine, and vice versa. But
hopefully this is sufficient to examine the church growth implications of the
Warren and Moore quotes, and expand them a bit.

By contrast a conservative church holds to a conservative
theology which is fixed by scripture alone for all time. Thus a conservative
church will (or should) be strict over what it considers the faith.

Where Do Liberal Churches Come From?

Both Warren and Moore indicate that liberal churches are
inherently weak; they hasten church decline (Warren), and they are unable to
start new churches (Moore). The fact remains that although the denominations
that are dominated by liberal beliefs are declining the fastest, and have been since
Dean Kelley’s [3] study from the 1970s, they do not decline that fast. So why
are there still liberal churches? Why do they survive, and in some cases
thrive?

I will put forward three reasons:

1. Church Leaders Liberalise, but Members Remain Conservative

One reason church leaders liberalise is that the seminary
system encourages liberal beliefs in church leaders. I think that is what Rick
Warren was getting at when he said, “it
only survives due to tenured academics”. A similar point was made by
sociologist Rodney Stark, who in a book review, suggested European churches
suffered from “institutionalised clerical atheism” [4], i.e. the institution of
the church encourages doubt in its ministers. My suggestion is that this is aided in part by the seminary/
theological college system of training, the institution that affects the belief
system of those it trains.

Thus in this scenario those who are called into full time
ministry are sent away to a college, where they learn theology at the hands of
academics with liberal beliefs. They are then sent to conservative congregations
and spend their ministry trying to change their people’s views with the “latest
scholarship” they picked up at seminary.

(i) First result of liberal leadership

One potential result of the liberal ministry is that those
who are conservative in the congregation leave and go elsewhere. The church in
which I was initially raised is an example of this. In common with many Welsh
Presbyterian churches it was rooted in the conservative evangelical theology of
the 18th century revivals. When the 1960s started a liberal minister
came, who taught people to doubt the orthodoxy they had received. In ten years
the church emptied from a few hundred to only a handful of members, as people left
and found other conservative churches. After another decade the church was
closed. This was repeated across the UK, so for a while the number of liberal churches
grew, but not all their people were liberal. As such the number of members
in liberal churches declined, firstly through transfer then through death, lack
of young people and inadequate conversion.

Figure 1 expresses these ideas. The more people in church
the more become leaders, the more liberalise and the more liberal teaching
injected back into church. This teaching reduces conversion, reduces the number
of children of church members who progress to membership, and increases, after
some delay, the number who leave the churches so affected. All the loops are
balancing loops sending the church numbers to zero.

Figure 1: Liberal
ministry causing church decline

(ii) Second
result of liberal leadership

A second result of a liberal ministry is that the most
academic of the liberal ministers have such a difficult time in churches that
they find a better role for themselves back in the academic environment. Thus
they return to seminary as educators and the cycle of the seminary liberalising
the next generation of ministers is complete. This is captured in the
reinforcing loop of figure 2. The reinforcing nature of the loop suggests that
the process of liberalising accelerates, and combined with figure 1 church
decline accelerates.

Figure 2: Liberal ministry reinforcing the liberalising of
seminaries

The conservative churches that survive are strong and have a
healthy membership. They send the larger numbers to seminary, but some of these
trainee ministers become liberal and start the decline process again in the
next batch of conservative churches to take on liberal ministers. Thus although
a given liberal congregation may die in a couple of generations, liberalism,
and liberal churches last much longer, fed by the seminary system that changes
the beliefs of its conservative intake.

I think this has been the canonical evangelical view of the
effects of liberalism on the church, and within which the Warren and Moore
quotes are set. However I think
there are more dynamics taking place than the above scenario suggests.

2. Church Members Liberalise, but Leaders Remain Conservative

In this scenario the minister is conservative but the
congregation is in varying degrees of belief from conservative to liberal. These
are not two distinct groups but a spectrum of people from one extreme to the
other. Three results spring out.

(i) First result of conservative leadership

The liberal members leave and join liberal churches. Now at
this point I am indebted to a medievalist blogger, Magistra, et Mater [5], who
has used my models to examine the interaction between liberal and conservative
churches [6]. Starting with my concept of enthusiasts as the church members who
are chiefly responsible for conversion, Magistra suggests that some of them
cease to be enthusiasts because they lose enthusiasm for the conservative faith
in which they were converted. Thus not only do they become inactive in
evangelistic work, they become more liberal as well. There comes a point where
such liberal people cannot fit into the church of their conversion, thus they
leave and join a liberal church [7]. They are now a specific source of recruitment
to the liberal church.

These ideas are captured in figure 3, where the conservative
church is in red and the liberal one in blue. The enthusiasts recruit from the unbelievers. After a time
they cease recruiting and become inactive believers, initially conservative but
later becoming liberal. They are still in the conservative church. Eventually
the liberal members of the conservative church leave and join a liberal church,
figure 3, part A [8].

Figure 3: Sources of
recruitment to liberal churches due to conservative churches

(ii) Second result of conservative leadership

I will go further and suggest that there are a number of
enthusiasts who get emotionally hurt by their church and also leave. I have
noticed a tendency for such hurt people to reject the beliefs of those who hurt
them, thus zealous conservative evangelicals abandon that version of the faith,
because that was the belief system of the people they fell out with. After some
time such hurt people also find a home in a more liberal church. Where beliefs
are less strong, there is more tolerance and people are less likely to get
hurt, figure 3, part B.

(iii) Third result of conservative leadership

Magistra describes another effect of the recruitment
activities of an enthusiastic conservative church, that of negative evangelism.
In this case the enthusiasts of the conservative church have a negative impact
on unbelievers, turning them from the gospel message. She extends my
model to include hardened unbelievers, who are no longer open to the message of
the conservative church, figure 3 part C. However if they come across a liberal
church, perhaps through the community work of that church, they might find less
negative connotations, less demands made, less questions asked, and this is a
happier home for their religious quest [6].

Thus I have suggested three sources of recruitment to the
liberal church. The result is that rather than dying out, liberal churches can
last many generations, albeit at the expense of conservative churches. I am not sure if this is a standard
narrative as liberal churches see it. Perhaps someone could comment on this.

One side effect of this transfer of liberal people from
conservative churches, is that it keeps conservative churches conservative.
Strictness in maintaining doctrinal and behavioural standards leads to a strong
church, according to Dean Kelley’s definition, which can attract and retain
others [3]. Thus the losses of the liberal people from the conservative church may
be offset by conversion, and retention of those with conservative views, and
net growth of the church could result.

3. Church Leaders and Members Liberalise Together

Here the issue is not just the interaction between liberal
and conservative churches, but the interaction of church with an outside world
not part of any church. For a church to grow it needs effective contact with
that world. No church can afford to be so irrelevant it cannot get its message
across. But the beliefs and practices of the world keep changing, thus there is
pressure on the church to keep changing to keep itself relevant. Thus the
church over time may change its beliefs in stages, to keep in step with
culture, usually 10 to 15 years behind as change comes slowly in the church. Thus
there is a slow evolution of practices and beliefs of minister and members
alike.

For example, evangelical Christians are thought of as the
more conservative end of Christianity, there is (in theory) a fixed creed and
fixed set of behaviour patterns. However some evangelicals prefer to say they
are “conservative evangelical” as they recognise that not all
evangelicals are as true to that system of belief as they are. However there
are also: "open evangelicals", “progressive
evangelicals”, “small ‘e’ evangelicals”, “accepting
evangelicals”, to name but a few! Each extra word flags that some aspect of
belief, behaviour or attitude has, or could be modified. These are clear signs
of a movement that is diversifying, which is another way of saying becoming
more liberal.

Research Questions

I have proposed three reasons why liberal churches survive,
maybe grow, or at least do not decline as fast as one might think: Seminaries
generate liberal ministers; liberal people are generated by the actions of
conservative churches; and conservative churches themselves liberalise to stay
relevant. My research questions
are:

1) What are the relative effects of the three scenarios?
That is, which of the three has the strongest effect on the survival of liberal
churches and which has the least, at any given time?

2) Are there other scenarios I have missed?

3) Do the two types of churches actually need each other to
survive, as suggested by Magistra [7]? In other words is there a symbiosis
between them that keeps the conservative true, and provides the liberals with
new recruits?

A Spanner in the Works

This blog was originally meant to be a single article, but
as ever the material and ideas keep expanding so it is now part one of two
blogs, part two to follow. I will finish it by throwing a spanner in the works
– I will query the definitions of conservative and liberal!

In the 1970s a former Methodist minister turned researcher, the
aforementioned Dean Kelley, published a book entitled “Why Conservative
Churches are Growing” [3]. Looking at membership data of a range of
denominations in the USA he demonstrated that whereas most of the conservative
denominations were growing, the liberal ones were in varying stages of decline.
As I write this blog it is still generally the case, although some conservative
churches, such as the Southern Baptists, are now slowly declining [9]. Again it
is against this viewpoint that the comments by Warren and Moore were made.

However Kelley was the first to admit the title of his book
was confusing [3, p.xvii]. His thesis was not about conservative churches, or
growth; it was about strict churches being strong. Strong churches may grow, but there again they may not,
depending on the context.

Thus a conservative church could be lenient (the opposite of
Kelley’s strong) because it does not insist that all its members follow its
beliefs or behaviour code, or because it does not direct much effort or zeal
into evangelism. Discipline and missionary zeal are two of Kelley’s indicators
of strictness. Such a church would be weak, which according to Kelley would
include tolerating individualism, a reserve in sharing the faith, and a general
lukewarmness for spiritual things. Such a church may be in decline despite its
conservative beliefs.

By contrast a liberal church may be strict. Yes it tolerates
a wide range of beliefs, but it does not tolerate those whose beliefs exclude
others. A standard liberal creed is “we are tolerant of everything, except
intolerance” [10]. As such there
are people who would not fit in such a liberal church, and would have to go
elsewhere. All tolerance has bounds! Such a liberal church may be very vocal in
proclaiming its stance, not in evangelism, but in campaigning and lobbying
non-Christian groups in society. As such there would be considerable zeal for
producing opinion change, which could easily result in recruitment. Such a
church would be stronger than the conservative one mentioned above, and might
well grow more.

The issues connected with growth are not just theological as
the words “conservative” and “liberal” would imply, but organisational. How
strictly does the church keep to its beliefs, ethos, and behavioural norms,
whatever they are? The subject
will be returned to in a later blog.

[3] Dean Kelley, Why Conservative Churches are Growing: A Study in the Sociology of
Religion. Mercer University Press, revised 1986, originally 1972.

[4] Rodney Stark, Review of Pentecostalism: The World their Parish.Review of
Religious Research, 44(2), P.203, 2002. In the last paragraph he
suggests that institutionalised clerical atheism is a barrier to church growth
in Europe, and thus a subject worthy of investigation.

[10] I was once
part of a church growth research group that visited a liberal church working in
an inner city area. They were the only church in the area. When one of the
group asked the minister if any evangelical church had ever tried working in
the area, he replied “No, and if they did he would run them out because they
would upset the prostitutes and the gays!” The degree of strictness, dare I say
intolerance, shocked even the more conservative members of our research group.